Staff Profile

Career Summary

Biography

Dr. Ning Gu’s most significant research contributions have been made towards research in architectural and design computing, including topics such as generative design systems; computational design analysis, computer-supported collaborative design; virtual environments; Building Information Modelling (BIM); agent-based computing; digital design and rapid prototyping; and design education. The outcomes of his research have been documented in over 120 academic articles and published designs.

He is an Assessor for the Australian Research Council (ARC). He is a reviewer/guest editor for various international journals (Design Studies, Automation in Construction; AIEDAM, ITCon), and reviewer/chair for various international conferences (CAAD Futures; DCC, CAADRIA; CONVR; ANZAScA; IASDR) in the field of architectural and design computing. He has been identified as an Emerging Research Leader during 2011-2012, and received the Pro Vice-Chancellor's Award for Research Excellence at the University of Newcastle in 2010.

Ning’s career highlight includes being a Chief Investigator of an ARC Discovery Project (2010-2013) to develop computational design analysis of 20th Century canonical buildings; and being the Research Leader of a Cooperative Research Centre for Construction Innovation (CRC-CI) project (2007-2008) to examine the use of BIM as collaboration platforms for the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industry. In the BIM project, he has collaborated closely with leading industry partners and government sectors such as Bovis Lend Lease, Woods Bagot, John Holland, Thiess, Leighton Contractors, the State of Queensland and Sydney Opera House. He has also led or participated in various research projects on design grammars, procedural content generation in game environments, collaborative design in 3D virtual environments as well as mobile computing in design, at the University of Newcastle and the University of Sydney. He was a visiting scholar at Columbia University in 2002 and at MIT in 2011.

Administrative

Administrative expertise

Dr. Ning Gu is Program Convenor for Bachelor of Design (Architecture) at the School of Architecture and Built Environment. He is on the Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment Academic Promotions Committee; Teaching and Learning Committee; and Methodological Peer Review Committee.

London KA, Singh V, Gu N, Taylor C, Brankovic L, 'Towards the development of a project decision support framework for adoption of an integrated building information model using a model server', Handbook of Research on Building Information Modeling and Construction Informatics: Concepts and Technologies, Information Science Reference, Hershey, Pennsylvania 270-301 (2010) [B1]

Shih Y-T, Williams AP, Gu N, 'A method to investigate differences of sketching before and during CAD modelling process', Proceedings of the 2011 International Conference of the Association of Architecture Schools of Australasia, Geelong, Vic (2011) [E1]

Singh V, Gu N, Wang X, 'Technical features of BIM-servers for collaboration on building and construction projects', Proceedings of the First International Conference on Sustainable Urbanization (ICSU 2010), Hong Kong (2010) [E1]

Gu N, Singh V, London KA, Brankovic L, Taylor C, 'Building information modelling: What is in there for the architects?', ANZAScA 2008: Proceedings of the 42nd Annual Conference of the Australian and New Zealand Architectural Science Association, Newcastle, NSW (2008) [E1]

Gu N, Maher ML, 'Generating Virtual Architecture with Style', Proceedings of the 38th Conference of the Australian and New Zealand Architectural Science Association (ANZAScA 2004), University of Tasmania, Australia (2004) [E1]

The 18th International Conference of the Association for Computer Aided Architectural Design Research in Asia (CAADRIA 2013), National University of Singapore, Singapore, 15 - 18 May 2013$1,500Funding Body: University of Newcastle - Faculty of Engineering & Built Environment

Recomputing the canon: using computational methods to develop an alternative understanding of the history of 20th century architecture.$546,000Funding Body: ARC (Australian Research Council)

Understanding the implications of haptic devices in design: do human-computer haptic interfeces change design behaviours and outcomes?$7,600Funding Body: University of Newcastle - Faculty of Engineering & Built Environment

Understanding the implications of haptic devices in design: do human-computer haptic interfeces change design behaviours and outcomes?$7,000Funding Body: University of Newcastle - Faculty of Engineering & Built Environment

Nexus 2008: Relationships between Architecture and Mathematics$1,700Funding Body: University of Newcastle

ICCCBE-XII & INCITE 2008: Joint conference of the 12th International Conference on Computing in Civil and Building Engineering, and 2008 International Conference on Information Technology in Construct$1,500Funding Body: Ian Potter Foundation